Conference conversations

The reason why scientists like going to conferences (despite them often being held in stuffy hotel basements) is because of the conversations. People can be found who know what they are talking about, and discussions can be focused clearly on what is important, rather than what is trivial. The atmosphere at these conferences is a mix of excitement and expectations as well as pleasure at seeing old friends and colleagues.

The two of us just got back from the excellent ‘Open Science Conference‘ organised by the World Climate Research Programme (WCRP) in Denver Colorado. More than 1900 scientists participated from 86 different countries, and the speakers included the biggest names in climate research and many past and present IPCC authors.

The focus of the conference was on how climate research should be done in order to be of service to society. Hence, a fair bit of focus was given to how to create useful climate information, or ‘actionable science’. This is supposed to be part of a global framework for climate services (abbreviated as GFCS to make it a bit more cryptic). But there is a lot of discussion about exactly what form of information this would be, and there were many (not necessarily exclusive) ideas around.

Bruce Hewitson and David Behar both made strong cases that the context in which climate-related information was received was key to its utility. On a panel discussion with various ‘stakeholders’, a good argument was made that better ‘translation’ of climate information was a priority, and that perhaps the current demand is not for more science results. Perhaps the information we have about climate already is good enough for many purposes.

However, communicating that understanding to people who might benefit from it remains a work in progress. Communication involves an end-to-end two-way process, as opposed to simply sending off a message hoping that the recipient will understand. There are also ethical concerns linked to the context – what are the consequences of an incorrect forecast? Are there inequities in who benefits and who doesn’t? Scientists, on their own, are not necessarily well-equipped to deal with this.